Step 1: Create a Project in Visual Basic

For your first Visual Basic program, you will create a Web-browsing application that opens a Web page. Your first step in creating a Visual Basic program is to open Visual Studio and create a project. You will do this when you create any Visual Basic program.

To create a project for your program

The "Welcome to Visual Basic Express" screen appears. This is the interface for Visual Basic 2008 Express Edition, also known as the integrated development environment or IDE.

On the File menu, click New Project.

The New Project dialog box opens.

Select Windows Forms Application and click OK.

A new form displays in the IDE, and the necessary files for your project are added to the Solution Explorer window. If this is the first Windows Forms Application project that you have created, it is named "WindowsApplication1".

You just created a project for the Web-browsing program. A project in Visual Basic is a place to store the pieces of your program and keep those pieces organized.

When you first create a new project, it exists only in memory. If you close the Visual Basic IDE, you are prompted to save or discard the project. When you save it, you can give it a more meaningful name.

When you opened the New Project dialog box, there were several types of projects to choose from. Your Web-browsing program is a regular Windows-based Application, that is, a program that can be run from your Start menu.

When you created the project, a form (also known as a form designer) displayed in the IDE. This form represents a window that will display when the program is run. Many programs display more than one window, so a project can contain multiple forms.